I am a stroke survivor. My blog is about my recovery, family, and possibilities.

Monday, March 24, 2014

Strokes, Smoking and Children's Arteries

Stanford Dunham about 1988

When I was a child, our parents smoked. Some of my first
memories were of my parents smoking and my efforts to get away from the smoke. I
would rush through my dinner because Mom and Dad would “enjoy” a smoke after
dinner. Driving to Kalispell, Montana for vacations (where our parents were from) was torture
for me because of the cigarette smoke.

My dad was the worst, and he started smoking when he was
about 12. He smoked for years until his health deteriorated. He smoked about
50 years.

Mom stopped smoking years earlier than that. She stopped
smoking in her late 30’s and she remarried. After that she was so health conscious. Mom and my stepfather Karl exuded health.

However, Mom smoked when she was pregnant with
me. She didn't smoke when she was pregnant with my three older brothers. I was born in 1961 before the landmark
report published on January 11, 1964 by the Surgeon General's Advisory
Committee on Smoking and Health.

I had pneumonia several times before I was 6, and croup was always
a worry. I had major earaches for years. Even now I worry about pneumonia and bronchitis.
As an adult, I have had many bouts of pneumonia and bronchitis.

Perhaps the damage to my system when I was a child was so
severe, it might have been part of the causes of my strokes. Who knows? I have thought about that sometimes though I would never
blame my parents. I can't blame them. They didn't know. I didn't know.

They were great people. But, this new study makes me wonder
about my health and my strokes. People should never smoke, and kids should
never be exposed.

The Children’s Medical Center in Dallas just released a
study called “Passive
Smoking
Causes
Irreversible Damage
to
Children's Arteries.”
This is a long article but I am going to post this on my blog because it
is important.

Exposure to passive
smoking in childhood causes irreversible damage to the structure of children's
arteries, according to a study published online in theEuropean Heart Journal.

The thickening of the arteries' walls associated with
being exposed to parents' smoke, means that these children will be at greater
risk ofheart attacksandstrokesin
later life. The researchers from Tasmania, Australia and Finland say that
exposure to both parents smoking in childhood adds an extra 3.3 years to the
age of blood vessels when the children reach adulthood.

The
study is the first to follow children through to adulthood in order to examine
the association between exposure to parental smoking and increased carotid
intima-media thickness (IMT) - a measurement of the thickness of the innermost
two layers of the arterial wall - in adulthood. It adds further strength to the
arguments for banning smoking in areas where children may be present, such as
cars.

The study was made up of 2401 participants in the
Cardiovascular Risk in Young Finns Study, which started in 1980, and 1375
participants in the Childhood Determinants of Adult Health study, which started
in 1985 in Australia. The children were aged between three and 18 at the start
of the studies. The researchers asked questions about parents smoking habits
and they usedultrasoundto
measure the thickness of the children's artery walls once they had reached
adulthood.

The
researchers found that carotid IMT in adulthood was 0.015 mm thicker in those
exposed to both parents smoking than in those whose parents did not smoke,
increasing from an average of 0.637 mm to 0.652 mm.

"Our study shows that exposure to passive smoke in
childhood causes a direct and irreversible damage to the structure of the
arteries. Parents, or even those thinking about becoming parents, shouldquit smoking. This will not only restore their own health
but also protect the health of their children into the future," said Dr
Seana Gall, a research fellow in cardiovascular epidemiology at the Menzies
Research Institute Tasmania and the University of Tasmania.

"While the differences in artery thickness are
modest, it is important to consider that they represent the independent effect
of a single measure of exposure - that is, whether or not the parents smoked at
the start of the studies - some 20 years earlier in a group already at greater
risk ofheart disease. For example, those with both parents
smoking were more likely, as adults, to be smokers or overweight than those
whos parents didn't smoke."

The results took account of other factors that could
explain the association such as education, the children's smoking habits,
physical activity, body mass index, alcohol consumption and biological
cardiovascular risk factors such asblood pressureandcholesterollevels
in adulthood.

Interestingly,
the study did not show an effect if only one parent smoked. "We think that
the effect was only apparent with both parents smoking because of the greater
overall dose of smoke these children were exposed to," said Dr Gall.
"We can speculate that the smoking behaviour of someone in a house with a
single adult smoking is different. For example, the parent that smokes might do
so outside away from the family, therefore reducing the level of passive
smoking. However, as we don't have this type of data, this is only a
hypothesis."

Dr
Gall and her colleagues had shown previously that exposure to passive smoking
in childhood reduced the ability of the main artery in the arm to dilate in
response to blood flow in adulthood. This new study adds to the evidence on the
dangers of passive smoking for children.

In
the paper, the authors write: "Together, these studies suggest a direct
and pervasive effect of exposure to environmental cigarette smoke during this
period on both the vascular structure and function in adulthood."

They
continue: "Reducing young people's exposure to tobacco smoke is a public
health priority. Legislation can reduce passive smoke exposure, with
restriction of smoking in public places reducing hospitalizations for
cardiovascular and respiratory disease. Home smoking bans specifically benefit
young people and data from the USA suggest such bans have increased from about
50% in the mid-1990s to 85% in 2006-7, suggesting that exposure to passive
smoke at home is declining.Unfortunately, these reductions have largely
occurred in higher socio-economic groups, meaning socio-economic inequalities
in passive smoke exposure remain. Banning smoking in cars where young people
are present, which is enforceable and targeting an environment where exposure
is high, could reduce these inequalities. Such legislation already exists in
Australia, Canada, and USA. Our results support adoption of all measures that
protect young people from passive smoke."

In
an accompanying editorial, David Celermajer, Scandrett Professor of Cardiology
at the University of Sydney, Australia, and Dr Edmund Lau, clinical associate
lecturer at the University of Sydney, call on legislators worldwide to do more
to protect children from the harmful effects of tobacco smoke. "Much more
work needs to be done to control the tobacco epidemic and it is up to
legislators backed by the support of clinicians, scientists, and advocates to
end the tobacco epidemic in the 21st century. Today, this is one of our
greatest health care priorities," they write.

Subscribe To Dunham Family Blog

Followers

Welcome to our blog about strokes, family, and possibilities!

I had two massive strokes in January, 2012. I started blogging several years ago because of my son. I have changed my focus for my blog because of my strokes. My blog is about strokes, possibilities, and my family. I am blessed that I did not die, and I am grateful for my wife, my son, my brothers, extended family, and my friends who have been so supportive.

Mark, Heather, and Ethan Dunham

I am stroke survivor!

I am a stroke survivor. I had a stroke on January 10, 2012, and I had a massive stroke in the hospital three days later, January, 13, 2012.

I was a lobbyist and a CEO of several trade associations.

I am serving on the Board of the College of Western Idaho. I was elected three times most recently in November of 2016. I an on the Boards of the American Heart and Stroke Association and also on the Board of the Idaho Housing and Finance Association.